i’m in my feelings right now, reliving things that i thought i had buried deep in the back of my mind. i confessed that Him looking at me makes me self conscious sometimes. when He asked me why, i gave Him the short answer: i’m not used to the attention.

so here’s the long answer.. i had issues with my dark skin most of my life. coming up, i got picked at a lot because of it. i was called ugly, a monster, all kind of things. i wanted to disappear a lot of times. see, some dark skin girls counter this by fighting, being loud, and so on. things like that have never been in my nature though, so i just became a wall flower. if i kept my head down and did as little as possible to bring attention to myself, i figured people would leave me alone. and they did for the most part. i had a lot of targets: being dark, being poor, mom being an addict.. ugh, i even had a jheri curl at one time. just imagine.. so yea, there were really hard days for me back then. i always had good grades, was nice to everybody (even the ones that picked on me), i didn’t start trouble, and i stayed to myself. pretty soon i was just the weird quiet nerd people came to for answers on their tests. by the time i got to high school, i was pretty much a ghost; until i quit. it was just one day and looking back on it now i feel so stupid for letting it be the reason that i quit. i can’t even remember what i was wearing, but i must have committed a heinous dress code crime. all that day i got picked on and shit threw at me. i couldn’t take it. i called my grandma, faking a migraine and the next day i told mama i wasn’t going back, i had just turned 16 and in the state of nc, she couldn’t make me go to school if i didn’t want to at that age. she was so mad. i think she was more disappointed than anything, but it came out as anger.

over the years i just got used to being in the background. yea i was fucking, but that’s how i got the attention that i wanted. it didn’t matter that i’d probably never hear from that person again, or if i did it would be only be for one thing. i was finally getting attention. after awhile that got old. i had a few friends but those were superficial friendships. they talked as much shit about me as so-called outsiders did. so, i was back to being by myself. you get used to it.

when i got with my bd, it was more or less getting what i was used to. he hardly notices me unless dinner isn’t cooked lol. i expect that.

so now, with Him, even after all this time, i still get self conscious when He looks at me. it’s almost like i expect Him to call me a monster or something. and that’s fucked up. but, i’m fucked up. i like when He looks at me, i’ve never felt special enough to be paid attention to. when i opened up just a little to let Him know that and why, He didn’t believe me. and i didn’t know what to say because idk how to get Him to understand. how do i explain what its like to be ignored for most of my life to One who’s so used to getting attention, it gets on His nerves? idk.

today has pretty much been a breezy day for me. once the fam went to church, i lounged for a bit, then straightened up the house. we have had spring-like weather today, so the kids have been out almost all day. ny loves her phone, she’s always listening to music now. both of my kids have eclectic music tastes like me, they will listen to basically anything that sounds good to them lol. ny is stuck in the 90s for some whatever reason (probably me, idk); she was in the living room earlier downloading candy rain by soul 4 real lol. nick loves his phone just as much.. even though he’s had to endure the weekend without it. somehow, he ended up leaving his phone with a teacher friday and has to wait until monday to get it. why putting it in his pocket instead didn’t come to his mind, i will never know. but i did email the teacher about it, so there should be no issues come the morning.

we’ve been able to keep our heads above water a little better these past couple of months, so i’m hoping my stressing will start to abate a little. the bills are getting caught up, some even paid up. it’s nice to be able to breathe for a minute. after my brother’s heart attack, i am trying to be more mindful of my mind state and stuff. some things i can’t help but worry about but now i am trying to not dwell on my worries as much. things will happen; some i will have control over, many i will not. those are the ones i dwell over the most, the things i cannot control. i have to get better at letting go.

it seems W/we have turned another corner.. it was wonderful the time i had with Him. i asked why He changed His mind, all He said was He feels differently. i don’t know what that means but i am learning not to ask many questions concerning the hows and whys of the decisions He makes. god i missed Him. i was a quivering mess and still wanted more. needed it. He just…after all these years (it boggles my mind sometimes thinking about how long [off and on] W/we’ve been in E/each O/other’s lives) nobody makes me feel/react the way He does. my mind and body were singing and for just a little bit the shit that i’ve done left my thoughts. i was His, even if for just that moment, and i sank into that. i was feeling Him, able to touch Him (minimally so as not to press my luck), the world dissolved away for me. for that time it was just Him and me. then it had to end unfortunately. my thoughts came crashing back with new ones woven in. new worries now. but all i can do is live in the moment with Him. He’s in the midst of moving so He’s busier than before. i don’t want to be a bother.

and then there’s my nia, most adorable chocolate drop you ever did see :D she is the culmination of everything W/we have been through, but she is way more than that. she is my light, my love, my little magical demony chocolate delight. she is all the good and pure intentions i’ve ever had where He’s concerned. she is perfect in every way and i couldn’t love her more if i birthed her in real. i have four children, nick, ny, nickko, and nia. i love them all equally in ways i’m sure many can’t understand. no, nickko and nia aren’t my real kids. if it hadn’t been for ‘vu, i would probably have never been blessed with them in my life, but here they are and i love them just as much as nick and ny. they are my babies, end of story.

t.j. called from work saying that he was having a dizzy spell, his job ended up having to call an ambulance for him, and now he’s at the hospital. seems like its a good ending to a not-so-good situation right? well not so much. i had to take manda to get the truck (because his hardheaded ass drove to work, but i’ll get to that) and on the way, she let me know t.j. hasn’t been doing what he’s supposed to do. he was supposed to change his diet, start a few medications, and stop smoking those damn ports. his doctors had him on the patch while he was in the hospital after he had his heart attack, sent him home with a prescription for chantix. manda told me that her son’s grandmother AND me and t.j.’s godmother told him he did not have to buy the chantix because they could get it for him, free of charge. he’s still has the full bottle his step-son’s grandmother gave him. then on top of that, he hasn’t been keeping his nitroglycerin or his aspirin on him like he’s supposed to. he hasn’t even cut back on his cigarettes and quite frankly, manda thinks he’s smoking more than he was.

then, the icing on this whole fucked up cake, he drove himself to work. my brother does not nor has he ever had a fucking driver’s license. he keeps getting his black ass behind the wheel, and never mind the fact that he’s been pulled over numerous times and has gotten numerous tickets for driving without a license and has a court date coming up on the 9th. he still drives. if it was just going back and forth to work that would be one thing, but t.j. drives wherever like he’s legal. so i have to think what would have happened if he had his dizzy spell while he was driving? what would have happened then? he doesn’t think about this shit… its like i’m having to take care of mama all over again because he is just like her. its like he’s trying to pretend like his heart attack never happened and he can keep doing the exact same shit he was doing before he had it. that’s exactly how mama was. she had to have her chest cracked open twice and have a leg removed and she continued on like the doctors had magically made her body parts brand new. i talked, prodded, and fussed at mama until i was damn near blue in the face. every time she made it seem like she was going to/wanted to get her health together. and then we’d have the argument all over again a few days after that.

i am not going through that with my little brother. i refuse to let him go down that road knowing where it leads. other than my kids, him and his kids are all i got. and i won’t get into how he’s being unfair to manda, probably not even thinking about what she goes through each time he has to go to the hospital. i know she and i don’t consider ourselves friends but she is my family and i have to think about her too.

i’m just.. tired. feels like deja vu or something and not in a good way.

today is my mama’s birthday. last year, t.j. and i had a family get together; this year though, i just want to chill by myself. the kids are gone with one of their big cousin for tonight, so i think i’m going to spend the day with nia on imvu later on. i’m feeling weird today. since my car is down i haven’t been able to get to the grocery store yet. i wanted to cook a dinner for her, some of her favorite foods. but i have no car and no kids, so that’s that.

i finally came to a realization about myself the other day: i have been so scared of turning into my mom, but quietly it seems i have. not in a bad way though. my mom’s nickname was Mavet, she was like the neighborhood mom and that is no exaggeration lol. dozens of people around here have slept on a couch, got a home cooked meal, had someone to talk to and get advice from (whether they wanted it or not lol), all courtesy of my mom. it hasn’t gotten to the point of kids semi living here like we used to have a houseful back in the day, but i have a lot of children in my life right now. the kids i babysit, nieces and nephews, my kids’ friends, and some of the neighborhood kids all know they are welcome in my home for whatever. my mom helped to raise a lot of kids in her day and it makes me feel good that i can carry that on in my life. my mom and i are more alike than i like to admit, but i don’t mind one bit having her passion for taking care of others.

it also feels good to finally be able to let go of most of my emotional baggage. moms and daughters have tricky relationships; i won’t go into it now, but my mother and i was no different. though i will always regret not talking to her about the way i felt, i am no longer allowing those feelings to hold me hostage. she is so much more than the addict i hated and it is up to me to reconcile my feelings about that. i can no longer continue to hold that against her. doing that, i think, has poisoned me far worse than what she did. i let that shit fester until i was rotten on the inside… fact is, she wasn’t the only one who helped shape me and i can’t keep on blaming her as if she was. mama was not innocent nor perfect. regardless, i’m grown now. i’m just admitting that for the longest time all i saw in her was an addict. in order for me to get my shit together i have to acknowledge all the parts of her. she was a good mom some of the time and i have to remember that too.

everything is lessons i guess when it all boils down. before i ever heard the phrase “hurt people hurt people”, i lived it. my mom was damaged. she spent most of her life trying to prove to nanny that she was not a mistake (my grandma’s words to her), that she was just as “good” a daughter as my aunt. i will never know if that is what pushed her to drugs, but it damn sure couldn’t have helped it any. so, she was the black sheep of the family. which is the only family me and my brother really have. the donor’s family don’t fuck with us and we happily reciprocate. its crazy because both side of family is pretty much bougie and its other levels of bullshit that come with that mindset. anyway. mama grew up with nanny pretty much abandoning her and she was raised by her grandma. i can’t even imagine what that had to have felt like. plus living in the shadow of her younger sister? only now can i even begin to empathize. it had to have been awful. i’ve heard some stories about her when she was coming up, but honestly listening to my older cousins, she wasn’t doing anything the rest weren’t doing. so i really don’t know how she got the black sheep status. she didn’t wild out any harder than her cousins or sister and most of them (including her sister) started having their kids years before i came along. -cough- out of wedlock i might add. mama helped them raise their babies.

was it terry (me and t.j.’s donor) or her drug addiction once she got older that made her the black sheep? coming up, it always seemed like that’s just how it ALWAYS was. my aunt and older cousins and their kids were the ones that hung out and stuff. that is just how it was. mama let me know as i got older that when i was born, nanny tried to convince mama to give me over to her. for whatever reason nanny felt like my mom and terry wouldn’t be able to take care of me. it never happened and i never found out why my grandmother felt that way. however, nanny never made it a secret that she hated terry. he used to beat the shit out of my mom. plus i believe once mama got with him, that’s when she got on the harder drugs. i’ll never know for sure because neither her or mama talked about that.

little side anecdote, lol: like i said, nanny hated terry. terry is the one who named me. for the first four to five years of my life she refused to call me tamika. she said it was too common, but i think she felt it was ghetto at the time because she called me tammy. a couple of my cousins disliked the name tamika as well (for whatever reason), but they did like my middle name so they called me lise. to this day though, nanny doesn’t spell my name right lol and i am 35 years old. i can only imagine the conniption she had when terry made my brother a junior lmao.

for good or ill, she is the mama that i had. i can’t keep pining for a relationship we never had or a conversation that’ll never be. some things i probably don’t want to know anyway, i’ll be honest. but i do refuse to keep carrying around this generational hurt any longer. i think its the best way i can honor mama.

my back is killing me! i have been trying to deal with this all day and have been failing miserably. i stretched after i woke up this morning, like a regular yawning-while-stretching-my-arms-to-the-sky kind of stretch. next thing i know, my back locked up and all i felt (feel) was pain across it. i tried to stand and immediately fell to my knees. it has been a long time since i have felt pain this intense, i had to get help to the shower, hoping that the hot steady stream would unravel the knots in my muscles. all to no avail. i popped four generic ibuprofen but the pain, lawd the pain. i finally pulled out mama’s empi select, and set both ends on 4.5. it helped, a lot, but i was barely able to do anything with my babies today. kenzie always wants to play and she was so not feeling me not playing with her like i normally do. hell, i could barely lift rah and every time i had to bend to change his diaper or pick him up period, my back screamed. i was a little lucky today in that yummy stayed home with her mom, so i had 2 kids to keep today instead of my usual three. it is not as bad as it was, but i can feel the pain amping itself back up, so i had to put the empi back on. now i have both ends set on five and the little shocks are set on pulse, so its continuous and feels almost like a ripple effect through my muscles to me. if it doesn’t subside much i am going to have ny cook the chicken tonight. there’s leftover sides that they can piece together from yesterday and the day before so they’ll have a complete meal. thank goodness i ran up on that list of movies because looks like i am going to be down, at least for the night.